How Much Should Church Cost You?

Yesterday Rachel Held Evans posted this thought provoking piece.  Especially intriguing to me was Diana Butler Bass’s response to New York Times author Ross Douthat’s article "Can Liberal Christianity Be Saved?".  Evans posted this summary of Bass’s response on her blog:

Diana Butler Bass responded with an article entitled “Can Christianity be Saved?”  in which she reminds Douthat that conservative churches are also in decline. “In the last decade,” she writes, “as conservative denominations lost members, their leaders have not equated the loss with unfaithfulness. Instead, they refer to declines as demographic "blips," waning evangelism, or the impact of secular culture. Membership decline has no inherent theological meaning for either liberals or conservatives. Decline only means, as Gallup pointed out in a just-released survey, that Americans have lost confidence in all forms of institutional religion.  The real question is not 'Can liberal Christianity be saved?' The real question is:'Can Christianity be saved?' 

Intriguing because I did not know this (the decline of conservative churches) was the case. 

Recently I finished reading Rodney Stark’s The Triumph of Christianity.  In his chapter on “Pluralism and American Piety,” Stark makes an interesting suggestion.  “As is evident in most consumer markets, people do not usually rush to purchase the cheapest model or variety, but attempt to maximize by selecting the item that offers the most for their money—that offers the best value. (359)”  Crass language to describe the religion business, I know, but consider a few of his examples.

Stark points out that the American religious landscape was dominated by traditional denominational options at the country’s outset in 1776, but then the far stricter Methodists moved in becoming the largest denomination in America by 1850.  Then by the dawn of the 20^th century, the Methodists had greatly reduced the moral requirements to be a member in good standing and their decline already had begun. (359-60).

This pattern, Stark points out, shows up in the data below:

The denominations at the top of the list have “discarded traditional Christian teachings and ask little of its clergy and members—the Episcopalians long tolerated Josh Shelby Spong, an extremely vocal atheist, as a bishop. (360)”

One might be tempted to point to the Catholic Church as anomaly in some way or form, given the relative absence of shift in data, but this is not the indicative of the whole story.  After the amendments of Vatican II the number of monks and nuns plummeted.  Why?  Stark argues it was because the sacrifices required of people to be in these orders was reduced.  “Fore example, many orders of nuns were allowed to abandon their elaborate garb and wear clothing that does not identify them as members of a religious order.  Other council actions revoked rules requiring many hours of daily prayer and meditation in convents and monasteries. (362)”  Within a year there began a rapid decline in the number of nuns.  In the U.S. the number of nuns went from 176,671 in 1966 to 71,487 in 2004 (363).

Stark’s conclusion: competition does not reward “cheap” religion.

One of my friends recently called Stark “bombastic” in some of his claims.  I know that we should always be wary of statistics and that generalizations are never completely correct so I will share this anecdotal evidence. 

I recently received a phone call from a prospective Truett (Baylor’s seminary) student.  He became a Christian at a Passion event.  As a result he has developed deep affinities with that movement and wanted to know if, since this was the church David Crowder helped start, we were a church like that? 

I will now make some of my own generalizations.  The Passion movement seems to be distantly connected with the neo-reformed movement.  I say "distantly" because I don’t think it is explicitly so.  Louie Giglio, though a Calvinist, is seeking to make Christians, not just Calvinists.  And though John Piper is a frequent speaker I would guess the masses have a Christian faith more akin to Francis Chan or Beth Moore, at least in expression.  I say that because my suspicion was that this student was really wanting to know if we were a neo-reformed church. 

Wanting to be articulate in my response to this student I began asking what a church like “this,” was like.  We chatted extensively about atonement, providence, salvation and a bunch of other theological issues that I thought might help him make a decision.  Some issues made it clear how divergent our views were, some issues made clear how much we had in common.  At one point we got to a “so what’s really important for you about church,” question.  His answer surprised me.  It was essentially that he wanted a church that partner with him in sharing the gospel at whatever the cost, even if it meant death like the early martyrs died. 

I follow John Piper on Twitter.  Occasionally I’ll click on a link as I did when this was posted on the Desiring God blog.  For all my theological objections, I can agree with neo-reformers on this: the gospel demands our life … all of it. 

I’ve said this much about the neo-reformers for two reasons.  1. As far as I can tell, they are the fasting growing religious movement in this country.  2. They understand that the gospel is costly. 

Dietrich Bonheoffer understood better than most of us that grace is not cheap.  Because grace is not cheap, neither should our ecclesiology be.

My favorite David Crowder Band song is “I’m Trying To Make You Sing.” 

The song, just two verses, remind me of the profound and haunting nature of the gospel:

And I'm trying to make you sing


From inside where you believe


Like it's something that you need


Like it means everything



And I'm trying to make you feel that


This is for real, that life is happening


That it means everything


I'm just trying to make you sing 

I think the churches that will grow will be those that cost you something to be a part of. 

What North Carolina Really Got Wrong

I recently read this article which features John Piper's decisive stance on the issue of homosexual marriage.  Despite my consistent disagreement with John Piper on most things theological, I can appreciate his black and white approach to those issues.  He doesn't leave people guessing what he believes and in this case who the word marriage belongs to.  I cite him because this is the problem in this debate.  No one is taking the time to talk about who gets to define what marriage is. 

Shortly after the recent vote in North Carolina on the amendment to ban homosexual marriage, my cousin, a woman who is apprehensive of church, but nonetheless a faithful Christian, sent me this message:

“In my normally not-overly-political church this morning, I was a little surprised by what struck me as political fear-mongering. The pastor said that if homosexual marriage becomes legal, then it is just a short step before all churches of all denominations will be required to marry homosexual couples, and that refusal would be discrimination. From there, the discrimination would result in churches losing their tax exempt status. And even mentioning God's condemnation of homosexual behavior would be considered discrimination and bullying, resulting in the incarceration of pastors who preach the Word.”

My cousin wanted to know if this assertion by her pastor was in fact true.  The preacher used 2 Timothy 4:1-6: “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.” His main point was that homeliticians must preach the Word faithfully despite consequences.

I had a feeling that the heart of the issue, however, was not courage, but marriage, the word marriage. To whom does the word marriage belong and what does it mean?

In 1996 former President Bill Clinton signed into law the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Under the law, no U.S. state or political subdivision is required to recognize a same-sex marriage treated as a marriage in another state. Section 3 of DOMA codifies the non-recognition of same-sex marriage for all federal purposes, including insurance benefits for government employees, Social Security survivors' benefits, and the filing of joint tax returns.[1]

Americans often vote on the “definition of marriage.” Though I’m a free-church protestant I sometimes find myself envious of high church traditions that have taken the time to name important truths.  The Catholic Church, for example, counts marriage as one of its seven sacraments.  So when a marriage is performed by a priest, he is aiding God in a covenant forming ceremony in which an outward sign becomes an inward reality. 

The community I pastor would say something like: marriage happens when a Christian community witnesses two Christians exchange vows that reflect a Christological commitment of covenantal fidelity.  For the state, marriage happens when the license is signed and tax statuses are officially changed.  The state will never be able to do what the church does nor the church what the state does.

For this reason it’s intriguing that American Evangelicals get so feisty about the state’s definition of marriage. So who really marries the couple?  Who owns the word marriage?

This suggests that we’ve lost our gospel imagination and begun taking our cultural cues from the state.  The state issues decisions that don’t reflect Christian values all the time.  To be frank, that doesn’t bother me. I don’t expect the state to be Christian. 

In the Spring of 2004 I spent my last few weeks at Bethel University studying for finals and my last few weeks at Woodland Hills Church listening to Greg Boyd preach a six week sermon series entitled, “The Cross and The Sword.”  This series later became the book, The Myth of A Christian Nation.  In that six weeks I watched that church lose nearly a thousand of its regular attendees.  Boyd killed one of America’s most sacred cows.  He told the church to get out of the state’s bed.

As a pastor I’m often asked if I think homosexual marriage should be legalized.  I respond by asking someone if they think I should have been circumcised by a Jewish Mohel.  Obviously not, because we don’t believe the same thing about circumcision.  Obviously, the state and I don’t agree on what marriage is or rather when someone is married so I don’t really care how they define it.

It strikes me that what we really ought to vote on is whether or not “marriage” is a distinctively Christian word.  If so then one of two things should happen:

In communities of Christian faith that have decided marriage should be restricted to a man and a woman, and that community of faith existed in a state that passed a law similar to the one described by my cousin’s pastor, then the church’s job is to be defiantly faithful.  If they lose their tax status so be it.  This is a small price to pay when compared with the testimony of early Christian martyrs.  

On the other hand, if a Christian community or denomination decided that covenantal metaphors in scripture should be extended to same sex couples, and if that community of faith lived in a state that had passed laws prohibiting otherwise, then they should be defiantly faithful.  They should offer the marriage sacrament to those couples, invite them to marriage retreats, list them in the directory as married and anything else that would testify to the fact that the church lives by a different reality than the world.  Sure the church cannot change a homosexual couple’s tax status or legalize their adoptions, but they can bear witness to their convictions, which is rooted in the truer reality. 

What the church should not do, is let the state define who can participate in God’s activity of forming covenantal bonds or pay any attention to the state when it tries do so.  That is unless we have decided to let the state define “marriage” for us. 

---

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_of_Marriage_Act (6-1-12)

Sunday Preview

Daniel 5 

Pentecost Preview

This

and then this. 

find out why tomorrow. 

Goodbye to Good Fridays

At the beginning of 2007 in the middle of what Texas calls winter, I was working as a park ranger for Cameron Park.  Lindsay was 7 months pregnant with Roy and there was no shortage of unsolicited advice on what to expect with our first child.  My friend and park-rangering-coworker Lanny managed to catch my ear with his qualifier, “I know everyone is giving you advice, so I’ll just say this,” and then his advice, “enjoy it, because it goes fast man.” Lanny was speaking from experience.  He was then, a father of a 19-year-old son and so had witnessed time’s expeditious sprint into the future. 

Because I’m an enneagram type 3, I have trouble connecting to my emotions.  For this reason it takes me a good deal of time to figure out what I appreciate.  Ask me how a movie or a vacation was and I’ll tell you to check back in with me in three months.  Once I commit emotionally I become incredibly nostalgic.  My parents are selling the house I grew up in after living there for 27 years.  My siblings didn’t bat an eye.  I created liturgy and demanded we have a goodbye ceremony.  When I watched Woody Allen’s Midnight In Paris I was confronted by my own condition. 

Last night Lindsay spoke a truth that I didn’t think much of in the moment, “tomorrow is your last Friday with Roy.” 

Here are the facts that make sense of that statement.

1.     Friday is the one day I am at home with the kids and Lindsay is at work.

2.     This is Lindsay’s last Friday of work for the 2011-2012 academic year.

3.     When she returns to work in the fall, Roy will be in kindergarten.

      Today was my last Friday with Roy.  I’ve tried to do something different with the kids on Fridays since my super-mom-wife exhausts Waco’s good parenting options throughout the rest of the week (library time, the zoo, the museum, Pinwheel Kids, etc.). Consequently I’ve elected to make Fridays doughnut and Barnes and Noble day. 

(Our last Barnes and Noble trip together)

(our last doughnut trip together.  If you were astute enough to notice the wardrobe change it's because a trip to the gym interrupted our routine)

There are only a few things I love more than Christmas, and to celebrate my love for the holiday I’ve begun collecting Kohl’s St. Nicholas Square Christmas Village.  This year the kid’s Christmas gift to me was The Doughnut Shop.  The gift immortalized our experience.  It made me realize how sacred Fridays had become.  I had a peculiar response when I opened my gift.  I envisioned myself at 55, getting the Christmas decorations out of the attic and seeing that box.  The box would remind me of those precious days when life was so simple, the kids were that perfect age, and that on every Friday we used to go to the doughnut shop and Barnes and Noble together.  (I know, some of you just went here).

I didn’t hear what Lindsay said last night, but I did this morning when I woke up at 5:18.  I began doing what I do well … remembering.  Remembering when Roy was born, when he fell off his changing table at six months old, when he ate an entire pear at seven months, long nights fighting croup, his first day of mother’s day out, his first birthday, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th and the million moments that make life so incredibly meaningful. 

My local readers will know this well, but the rest you won’t so it’s worth retelling.  In 2005 I was part of a congregation that witnessed the tragic death of our friend and pastor Kyle Lake.  An electric wire improperly grounded was feeding electricity into a baptismal.  When Kyle, standing in water, grabbed a metal microphone stand the circuit was completed and his life was taken. 

We gathered two days later to say goodbye.  Kyle’s funeral officiated by Burt Burleson who had the wits to read through Kyle’s last sermon that was prepared, but remained undelivered on that Sunday morning he died.  In that sermon Burt found Kyle’s conclusion, which Burt read at the funeral.  Kyle’s healing words from the grave.  Last words from a pastor to his flock:

Live. And Live Well.

BREATHE. Breathe in and Breathe deeply.

Be PRESENT. Do not be past. Do not be future. Be now.

On a crystal clear, breezy 70 degree day, roll down the windows and

FEEL the wind against your skin. Feel the warmth ofthe sun.

If you run, then allow those first few breaths on a cool Autumn day to

FREEZE your lungs and do not just be alarmed, be ALIVE.

Get knee-deep in a novel and LOSE track of time.

If you bike, pedal HARDER and if you crash then crash well.

Feel the SATISFACTION of a job well done-a paper well-written, a project

thoroughly completed, a play well-performed.

If you must wipe the snot from your

3-year old's nose, don't be disgusted if the Kleenex didn't catch it all because soon he'll be wiping his own.

If you've recently experienced loss, then GRIEVE. And Grieve well.

At the table with friends and family, LAUGH.

If you're eating and laughing at the same time, then might as well laugh until you puke.

And if you eat, then SMELL.

The aromas are not impediments to your day. Steak on

the grill, coffee beans freshly ground, cookies in the oven.

And TASTE.

Taste every ounce of flavor. Taste every ounce of friendship. Taste every ounce of Life.

Because-it-is-most-definitely-a-Gift.”

Surreal.  That’s how I remember feeling when those words were being read.  Almost like Burt had made that up.  They were so perfect that it seemed like Kyle had been told he was going to die and was given a chance to share last words with the congregation. 

Those words have formed UBC and we all revisit them as we rediscover their  continuing relevancy. 

As I say goodbye to Good Fridays, I put on two sentences from Kyle’s last sermon.  No longer good words, but now the experience I wear, my heart yet again recognizes the need to:

Be PRESENT. Do not be past. Do not be future. Be now.

& also

If you must wipe the snot from your

3-year old's nose, don't be disgusted if the Kleenex didn't catch it all because soon he'll be wiping his own.

So now let me be that parent offering soon-to-be parents advice and echo my friend Lanny.  It goes fast, so be present to the million moments that continuously make up the precious now.  

why i'm not complementarian

I grew up in what I would characterize as a conservative evangelical home although by no measure were/are my parents ultra conservative.  Though my parents espoused, and still would something more akin to complementarian theology I think they embody a relationship that looks much more egalitarian.   

I hadn’t put much thought into the gender role theology my parents provided me with until I got to Bethel where evangelical trust fund babies would sit around a circle and debate all the important questions of the universe like “do you think women can be pastors?”  Evangelicals construct theology based on one thing, the paper pope.  For most of us this came in the form of the New International Version though some wild ones would use the New Living Translation.  Regardless of your translation, your gender role theology came from a few texts, chief among them—Ephesians 5.  Here the author is writing about household codes and says this:

22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. 23For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Saviour. 24Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, 27so as to present the church to himself in splendour, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind—yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish. 28In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

I have a confession to make about myself.  I think my strong inclination towards complementarian theology was informed as much if not more by what I will call the meta-fairytale, as it was scripture.  The meta-fairytale can come in all kinds of forms, but finds its chief expression in movies like Disney’s Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and perhaps most explicitly in Tom Cruise’s movie Legend.  In all of these meta-fairytales you have three essential elements: a damsel in distress, an evil foe to overcome and a hero who does the rescuing.  The damsel remains captive to the evil foe who is eventually overcome by the male hero who then rescues the damsel.

The meta-fairytale should not be discounted as archaic.  It’s a good story and to be sure, its explanatory power is so pervasive that scripture utilizes it to characterize Christ’s relationship with the church.  To boot, I like the meta-fairytale.  I stand on an island in a church of mostly moderates in my appreciation for John Eldredge.

Still, I think a problem arises when we construct a theology of gender based on scripture without being aware of latent meta-fairytale hermeneutic at work within us. 

Here’s what I mean.  Undoubtedly Ephesians says:

“22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord 23For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Saviour. 24Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands.”

But it also says  

“25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,”

I’ve grown suspicious of complementarians who are eager to point to Ephesians 5 in support of their case.  Jesus loved the church so much that He submitted to death by Roman execution.  40 lashes on the back, nails in the wrists and feet, beard ripped out, spear in the side etc.  You’ve seen Mel Gibson’s Jesus slaughtered.  You know the story.  It’s not that I don’t think complementarian males would endure this for their spouses.  Indeed they would.  This is at the heart of the meta-fairytale.  The hero faces the most atrocious forms of the death to rescue the damsel.  But as my friend Randy once pointed out in youth group, “people often talk about dying for Christ, but perhaps the much more difficult thing to do is live for Christ.”

I concur.  I just got done reading some of the martyrdom accounts in Rodney Stark’s new book, and I was unnerved.  But truthfully it often feels to me like being faithful in the mundane tasks of everyday life can take as much courage.  I’m constantly confronted by the question of death.  Will I follow Jesus in the death of not getting my way?  Will I follow Jesus in the death of putting my wife's needs before mine?  Will I follow Jesus in prioritizing my desires last in my family?  Will I follow Jesus in the death of living unselfishly with my finances and not be corrupted by greed? Death questions confront the way we live all the time. 

I’m thankful that I had the privilege of listening to Greg Boyd as my pastor in college.  One of the truths that he instilled in me is that power is quintessentially defined by Jesus hanging on a cross.  This is the way God expresses power in the world.  Jesus subverts our definition of power.  At the end of the day, power is not best expressed by Batman, Superman, Prince Charming or William Wallace.  Power, by Biblical standards, comes from below.  Power picks up a towel and serves.  Power chooses the less glamorous choice.  Power is not so insecure that it needs the final word.  Power does not need control. 

This definition of power exposes the difference between a Christological read of Ephesians 5 and a meta-fairytale one.  In my conversation with my college friends about gender roles it seemed that one way the truthfulness of the complementarain marriage would express itself would be that in major decisions where the couple disagreed the male would make the decision.  I think that notion is rooted in the meta-fairytale understanding of power and the not the Christological one. 

This last year my wife and I consumed all five seasons of NBC’s Friday Night Lights.  Never has a show so successfully depicted a realistic, healthy and dare I say Christian marriage as FNL did with Eric and Tami Taylor.  This article from Relevant gets it exactly right when of the Taylors it says, “It’s something of a miracle that a contemporary network television show could so vividly remind us of what is wonderful about families who stay together, struggle together and grow together.”

In the shows finale Eric and Tami’s marriage struggles reach an apex when they are simultaneously offered dream jobs.  Eric is offered a job as the head coach of Dillon’s all star team and Tami a job as the director of recruitment for a university in Philadelphia.  The impasse created by the circumstances is precisely the sort of thing that evangelicals debate about in their marriage discussions.  As is typical of a patriarchal culture we are led to believe that the Taylor’s will order their lives around Eric’s vocational opportunity. 

Here is a short compilation revealing how that situation resolves itself: 

The most biting critique I have of complementarianism is that it is fundamentally opposed to the notion of power that is defined by the cross.  At the juncture when leading in the way of Jesus might be most painful, evidence that complementariasm is subdued by the meta-fairytale emerges positing males as a specific kind of hero.  Complementarian theology finds its limits in self-sacrificial love when that love might entail sacrificing the traditional role that the hero gets to play in the meta-fairytale story. 

 Jesus would not just have died for his wife on a cross.  He would have died a vocational death for her as well.  Jesus would have taken the sucky job so that she could have the good one.  Jesus would use His power to lead her by elevating her to greatness at his own expense.  I wonder how many complementarians have considered that perhaps the most self-sacrificial thing they could do is embrace a lifetime at home with the kids so their wives could pursue what they wanted.  I wonder how many complementarians have considered that the cost of the cross might mean giving up vocational ambitions so their spouses could pursue theirs.  I wonder how many complementarians have considered that being the hero of their story might not mean being the hero in the traditional meta-fairytale sense at all.  Perhaps being the hero in this story means no one ever knows your name.  That being Christ means being the spouse who gets thanked in a lifetime achievement award speech by the other, not the one on stage accepting the award. 

Husbands if you do embrace this awesome responsibility of loving your wives do so “just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,” … I dare you. 

Michael Horton is fast becoming my favorite Calvinist or at the least the one I respect the most. I know I'm late to the game, but Relevant Magazine recently published an interview with him online that was in their January/Febuary issue.  I thought this response was appropriately gentle and equally critical.  

What do you think about the so-called “Neo-Reformed” movement, embodied by people like Mark Driscoll and Kevin DeYoung?

Horton: I recognize my own journey in the lives of many (especially younger) Christians who are embracing the label “Calvinist.” In any paradigm shift, the profound changes lead to excitement about the new discoveries and disillusionment with the old paradigm. This happens with all sorts of conversions: political, cultural and religious. We call this the “cage phase”—when new Calvinists need to be quarantined from society for a while! When a large number of people are entering this phase simultaneously, there’s excitement but also the danger of uncharitable and arrogant engagement with other believers.

It’s amazing—a theology that says we only know God because He has revealed and given Himself to us by grace, can be turned into a self-righteous assertion of our own discovery. It’s something we all have to guard against. This investigation isn’t about an ideology or a party label, but about diving together as brothers and sisters into the vast ocean of grace that is the common playground of all the saints.

I also hope that the “New Calvinism” movement will get beyond acronyms. Many of us come out of “fundamentalism”: the tendency to reduce everything to a few slogans and points. However, Reformed theology is just as interested in how we worship and live out our callings, the role of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the kingdom of God and other marvelous truths. As important as the “five points of Calvinism” are, they are part of a broader and richer confession.